a. One who belongs to another country, a foreigner; chiefly (now exclusively), one who resides in or comes to a country to which he or she is a foreigner; an alien.Now somewhat rare; the recent examples show mixture of senses 2a and 4a.

†b. Something that comes from abroad; esp. an exotic plant. Obsolete.

a. One who is not a native of, or who has not long resided in, a country, town, or place. Chiefly, a new comer, one who has not yet become well acquainted with the place, or (cf. 4) one who is not yet well known.

†b. In parochial registers: A person not belonging to the parish. Obsolete.The Latin equivalent extraneus (extranea) was also commonly used.

†c. strangers' silver (Scottish).

a. A guest or visitor, in contradistinction to the members of the household. Now chiefly with mixture of sense 4. to make a stranger of: to treat with ceremony, not as one of the family. Chiefly with negative.

b. Any of the things which are popularly imagined to forebode the coming of an unexpected visitor, e.g. a floating tea-leaf in the cup; an excrescence on the wick of a candle, causing guttering; a piece of soot flapping on the bar of the grate; a moth flying towards one.

a. An unknown person; a person whom one has not seen before; also in wider sense, a person with whom one is not yet well acquainted. Phrases, a perfect, a total, an utter stranger. Const. to.

b. Said playfully of a newborn child. Usually little stranger.‘Welcome, little stranger!’ was a quotation common in the early part of the 19th century, and sometimes printed or embroidered on articles for nursery use.

c. Vocatively. Originally in rustic use in the U.S.: a customary mode of address to one whose name is unknown. Now in general colloquial use: to address one who has not been seen for some time.

d. Predicatively, said of one whose visits have long ceased. Similarly in to be (quite) a stranger and variants, said of an infrequent visitor. †Also, one who never visits (a place), an absentee from.

e. Australian and New Zealand. An animal which has strayed from a neighbouring flock or herd.

a. A non-member of a society. Now rare.

b. Parliament. One who is not a member or official of the House, and is present at its debates only on sufferance. So occasionally with reference to a court of justice. I spy strangers: the formula used by a member in demanding the expulsion of strangers from the House.

a. One who has no share in (some privilege or business). Const. of, from. ? Obsolete.

b. Law. One not privy or party to an act. Const. to. Also, one not standing towards another in some relation implied in the context.

†a. Unacquainted with (a person, place, book, etc.). Obsolete.

†b. Ignorant of (an art, a language, etc.). Obsolete.

†c. Unaware of (a fact, state of things, something that has happened). Also with clause, to be no stranger, not to be unaware that. Obsolete.

d. Having no experience of; unaccustomed to. Said of persons and things.

a. Labrador. (See quot. 1792.)

b. Certain species of moths.

c. The Australasian fish, Odax richardsonii.

a. That is a stranger (in senses 1 – 5). Often hyphenated. stranger-guest (cf. guest-friend n. at guest n. Compounds 2): invented by Pope as a rendering of Greek ξένος; used occasionally by other writers for a stranger ( 1a, 4a) who is received as a guest.

b. Pertaining to a stranger or to strangers; also, situated abroad; foreign.

c. Not one's own (or its own); alien. rare.